Water for Elephants: Chapters 9–13

He hasn’t looked at me since yesterday's incident, and to be frank, I find it difficult to look at him, vacillating as I do from feeling the deepest empathy for his mortification to being barely able not to laugh.

I point at the defunct circus.

The flag is flying, and the smell of sour grease permeates the air.

Then she reaches out again. After several seconds of serious misgivings, I hold out my hand.

He frowns at me for a moment, arms akimbo.

The polar bear lies on his stomach, head and snout stretched in front of him. In repose he looks harmless—cuddly even, with most of his bulk concentrated in the lower third of his body.

It’s just dawned on me that the floors of their dens are conspicuously clean.

Uncle Al strides toward us in red waistcoat and top hat, his plaid-swaddled legs swallowing the ground. His grovelers follow, jogging in nervous spurts to keep up.

“Yes, Uncle Al. Of course, Uncle Al. Won’t you please come in, Uncle Al,” she intones.

August stares in consternation, and Marlena simply stares. I don’t know what to think. I’ve never encountered an animal this large.

The gatherings run the entire gamut, from celebratory soirées characterized by radio jazz and outbursts of laughter to the desultory gatherings of dirty men who huddle some distance from the train and pass around various types of intoxicant.

The gatherings run the entire gamut, from celebratory soirées characterized by radio jazz and outbursts of laughter to the desultory gatherings of dirty men who huddle some distance from the train and pass around various types of intoxicant.

“Well now, what have we here?” says a sultry voice from somewhere very nearby.

Barbara stands up for a moment, smoothes her skirt, looks furtively around, and then crouches.

Now her lipsticked mouth is coming at me, a gaping maw with tongue extended.

Her windsail of an ear moves forward and then back, and the trunk returns. I touch it tentatively, and then stroke it. I am entirely enamored, and so engrossed that I don’t see August until he comes to an abrupt stop in front of me.

An emaciated bay horse is tethered to a stake beside him, out of its head with terror.

A love for these animals wells up in me suddenly, a flash flood, and there it is, solid as an obelisk and viscous as water.

A love for these animals wells up in me suddenly, a flash flood, and there it is, solid as an obelisk and viscous as water.

No matter what I did last night, I cannot leave these animals. I am their shepherd, their protector. And it’s more than a duty. It’s a covenant with my father.

There’s a small amount of pus flowing down the giraffe’s long nasal passage. It’s not something I’d find alarming in a horse, but since I don’t know giraffes I decide to play it safe and fit her with a neck poultice, an operation that requires a stepladder with Otis at the bottom, handing me supplies.

Her eyes are huge and dark, and she has the velvet-soft lips of a horse. She’s wearing a halter and I hold on to it, but mostly she stays still as I swab out her nostrils and swaddle her throat in flannel.

Her eyes are huge and dark, and she has the velvet-soft lips of a horse. She’s wearing a halter and I hold on to it, but mostly she stays still as I swab out her nostrils and swaddle her throat in flannel.

Finally I see a Catholic church. I sit in a pew near the back for a long time, staring at the stained glass behind the altar. Although I want absolution dearly, I am unable to face confession.

Eventually I leave the pew and go to light votive candles for my parents.

I’m supposed to say something here, something to make him feel better, but I don’t. I’m not feeling particularly conciliatory.

I expect her to stay facing the wall, but instead she continues turning, spinning in some kind of dervish.

But my final thoughts are tactile...

And the one detail I can neither fathom nor shake, the one that haunts me into sleep: the feel of her fingertips tracing the outline of my face.

August lifts a piece of toast with flourish, smiling broadly with closed lips.

I replace the giraffe’s neck poultice, cold-soak a camel for a suspected hoof abscess, and survive my first cat procedure—treating Rex for an ingrown claw while Clive strokes his head.

He gesticulates wildly toward Rosie, ranting without pause. When his mouth finally closes, August’s opens, and he also gesticulates toward Rosie, waving the bull hook and thumping her on the shoulder for good measure.

I watch from across the menagerie as August’s mouth opens in shock, then outrage, and then vociferous complaint.

His face darkens and he waves his top hat and hook. Uncle Al gazes on, completely impervious.

One is wearing a suit, a derby hat, and a smile.

She is rapt. Her trunk hovers over its top, sniffing and trying to squirm its way around his arms into the clear liquid.

“Would you knock it off?”
“What?” he says, spreading his hands in feigned innocence.

I hate that I’m beholden to him.

“Well, I must say, Mr. Jankowski, I’m a little surprised. You’re normally...uh...rather adamant about walking.”

“He’s an old man,” she says.
“He’s ten years younger than me,” I say, straightening up indignantly.